Showing posts with label DIGGERS. Show all posts
Showing posts with label DIGGERS. Show all posts

Thursday, March 12, 2009

*The Revolutionary Ebb- Christopher Hill's English Revolution

Click on title to link to Wikipedia's entry for James Harrington one of the republican theorists (and founder of the Rota Club) mentioned by Christopher Hill in the book reviewed below.

Book Review

The Experience Of Defeat: Milton and Some Contemporaries, Penguin Books, New York, 1984

The first two paragraphs here have been used elsewhere in reviews of Professor Hill’s work.

The name and work of the late British Marxist historian Christopher Hill should be fairly well known to readers of this space who follow my reviews on the subject of the 17th century English Revolution that has legitimately been described as the first one of the modern era and that has had profound repercussions, especially on the American Revolution and later events on this continent. Christopher Hill started his research in the 1930’s under the tremendous influence of Karl Marx on the sociology of revolution, the actuality of the Soviet experience in Russia and world events such as the Great Depression of that period and the lead up to World War II.

Although Hill was an ardent Stalinist, seemingly to the end, his works since they were not as subjected to the conforming pressures of the Soviet political line that he adhered to are less influenced by that distorting pressure. More importantly, along the way Professor Hill almost single-handedly brought to life the under classes that formed the backbone of the plebeian efforts during that revolution. We would, surely know far less about Ranters, panters, Shakers, Quakers and fakers without the sharp eye of the good professor. All to the tune of, and in the spirit of John Milton’s "Paradise Lost", except instead of trying to explain the ways of god to man the Professor tried to explain ways of our earlier plebeian brothers and sisters to us.

In a sense this is a companion book to Hill’s earlier work on Milton’s role in the English Revolution and its aftermath that I have previously reviewed in this space (“Milton And The English Revolution”). However, the question posed by Hill has larger implications for radicals today. We have become, if we are in any way familiar with the trajectories of subsequent revolutions, especially the French and the Russian, painfully aware that revolutions flow and ebb. Not all the way back to the old regime, for the most part, but far enough back to cause anguish and demoralization in those who stood in the forefront of the revolution when it counted.

Not everyone, however, reacted to the new political realities in the same way. Some welcomed the new ‘conservative’ regimes, some stood on the side lines and some pondered what to do next. Thus we have such counterposed representative figures as Babeuf and Talleyrand in the French revolution or Trotsky and Molotov in the Russian. Needless to say, this phenomenon takes on a life of its own. However, as Professor Hill argues for the English Revolution and we should argue today this is no reason to give up on revolutions. Rather it is more necessary to learn to do a better job next time, if one gets the chance.

As for the English Revolution itself Professor Hill goes through his paces in pointing out the reactions of various factions and grouping within English society as the revolutionary events unfolded. Certainly the period just prior to the restoration was significantly difference from that early euphoria in the days of the military fight against the king. Thus for those religious radicals who thought that 1640 meant ‘Second Coming’ their reactions, most notably that of the Quakers after 1960, were to become quiet and inward-looking. For those like James Harrington and the Rota Club the restoration was more of a return to equilibrium and thus their reactions were mixed. Samuel Pepys, the famous diarist, is the ideal representative of this trend. The former Milton associate the poet Dryden can be taken as more extreme abject apologist.

For those intimately identified with the execution of Charles I the choices were grimmer. The executioner’s ax or flight. For those who were disturbed by the excess of the lower orders, like the clergyman Baxter, the restoration represented divine retribution against the ‘ungodly’. And for the literary lights like Milton it was time to reflect on the struggle and how to drive it forward even if this was a more circumspect propaganda effort than his previous work of behalf of the Commonwealth. Once again, for those familiar with Professor Hill’s work he has, like his muse Milton, tried to explain the ways of the English Revolution to today’s plebes. Kudos.


THE FOLLOWING IS A SONG BASED ON THE DIGGER EXPERIENCE IN 1650

If John Milton was the literary muse of the English Revolution then the Diggers and their leader, Gerrard Winstanley, were the political muses.

The World Turned Upside Down


We will not worship the God they serve, a God of greed who feeds the rich while poor folk starve.
In 1649 to St. George's Hill
A ragged band they called the Diggers came to show the people's
will
They defied the landlords, they defied the laws
They were the dispossessed reclaiming what was theirs.
We come in peace, they said, to dig and sow
We come to work the lands in common and make the waste
ground grow

This earth divided we will make whole
So it may be a common treasury for all "**
The sin of property we do disdain
No man has any right to buy or sell the earth for private gain

By theft and murder they took the land
Now everywhere the walls spring up at their command
They make the laws to chain us well
The clergy dazzle us with heaven, or they damn us into hell

We will not worship the God they serve,
a God of greed who feeds the rich while poor folk starve
We work and eat together, we need no swords
We will not bow to masters, nor pay rent to the lords

Still we are free, though we are poor
Ye Diggers all, stand up for glory, stand up now!
From the men of property the orders came
They sent the hired men and troopers to wipe out the Diggers'
claim

Tear down their cottages, destroy their corn
They were dispersed - only the vision lingers on
Ye poor take courage, ye rich take care
This earth was made a common treasury for everyone to share
All things in common, all people one
They came in peace - the order came to cut them down

WORDS AND MUSIC BY LEON ROSSELSON, 1981

*Poet's Corner- John Donne's "Death Be Not Proud"

Click On Title To Link To YouTube's Film Clip Of Julian Glover Reciting John Donne's "Death Be Not Proud".

Commentary

There is no accounting for tastes sometimes but I have always liked John Donne's poem "Death Be Not Proud". The recent past has been one where deaths have occurred in my family and among some close friends and so naturally I have thought of this poem. Yes, I know Donne was one of those metaphysical poets that were always harping on the "divided heart" or "two heart" literary tropes associated with that poetic style. Still that last line always seems right to me concerning the vagaries of our attitudes toward death.

Death, as the noted Marxist historian and biographer of Leon Trotsky Issac Deutscher once noted, is still one of the three great tragedies of life that that we face (sex and hunger being the other two, the last of which Marxists have focused their struggles on eliminating). Maybe in a more just future we will be able to cope with its terrors better. I note, as well, that the early 17th century when clergyman Donne wrote his poems and epistles is still considered the great age of meditation on the theme of death in the English-speaking world. But enough- here is his poem.

Guest Commentary

John Donne

"Death be not proud, though some have called thee"


DEATH be not proud, though some have called thee
Mighty and dreadfull, for, thou art not so,
For, those, whom thou think'st, thou dost overthrow,
Die not, poore death, nor yet canst thou kill me.
From rest and sleepe, which but thy pictures bee, 5
Much pleasure, then from thee, much more must flow,
And soonest our best men with thee doe goe,
Rest of their bones, and soules deliverie.
Thou art slave to Fate, Chance, kings, and desperate men,
And dost with poyson, warre, and sicknesse dwell, 10
And poppie, or charmes can make us sleepe as well,
And better then thy stroake; why swell'st thou then;
One short sleepe past, wee wake eternally,
And death shall be no more; death, thou shalt die.

Friday, January 09, 2009

*The Lessons Of Revolutionary History- English Style-Professor Christopher Hill's View

Click on the headline to link to a "Wikipedia" entry for Marxist historian, Christopher Hill.

The Lessons Of History- English Style

Some Intellectual Consequences Of The English Revolution, Christopher Hill, The University Of Wisconsin Press, Madison, 1980


The first two paragraphs here have been used elsewhere in reviews of Professor Hill’s work.

The name and work of the late British Marxist historian Christopher Hill should be fairly well known to readers of this space who follow my reviews on the subject of the 17th century English Revolution that has legitimately been described as the first one of the modern era and that has had profound repercussions, especially on the American revolution and later events on this continent. Christopher Hill started his research in the 1930’s under the tremendous influence of Marx on the sociology of revolution, the actuality of the Soviet experience in Russia and world events such as the then Great Depression of that period and the lead up to World War II.

Although Hill was an ardent Stalinist, seemingly to the end, his works, since they were not as subjected to the conforming pressures of the Soviet political line that he adhered to are less influenced by that distorting pressure. More importantly, along the way Professor Hill almost single-handedly brought to life the under classes that formed the backbone of the plebeian efforts during that revolution. We would, surely know far less about, Ranters, panters, shakers and fakers without the sharp eye of the good professor. All to the tune of, and in the spirit of John Milton’s Paradise Lost, except instead of trying to explain the ways of god to man the Professor tried to explain ways of our earlier plebeian brothers and sisters to us.

This slender volume, first delivered as a series Merle Curti lectures at the University Of Wisconsin, is sort of Hill’s summing up of the experiences that survived, one way or another, the English revolutionary period from 1640-60 and, more importantly, the monarchical restoration. Elsewhere I will review a later book, "The Experience Of Defeat" by Hill that deals with the question of the defeat of the revolution and it effects on some of the participants, including, as always, some material on Hill’s muse, John Milton. Hill’s contention here and in that book is that although the immediate defeat of the revolution dashed the dreams of the revolutionaries at the time English society did not, in fact could not, go back completely to the old regime- a society based on divine rule of kings, an inflexible and exclusive nobility and an iron-disciplined state church.

To that end, Hill discusses the continued lively underground of the sects thrown up by the revolution, the continued capitalist rationalization of agriculture (enclosures and other improvements), and, yes, the increased naval fleet that won its spurs under Cromwell and would be the vanguard for the nearly two century rule of the late British Empire. Be forewarned, this volume does not do more than outline Hill’s thesis. To flesh this out the reader will have to go to his other volumes and to other sources in the rich scholarship that has developed on the English revolution over the past couple of generations.

*Once Again On Christopher Hill And The England Revolution- Collected Essays

Click on the headline to link to a "Wikipedia" entry for Marxist historian, Christopher Hill.

The Collected Essays of Christopher Hill, Volume 2: Religion and Politics In Seventeenth-Century England, University of Massachusetts Press, Amherst, 1986

The name and work of the late British Marxist historian Christopher Hill should be fairly well known to readers of this space who follow my reviews on the subject of the 17th century English Revolution that has legitimately been described as the first one of the modern era and that has had profound repercussions, especially on the American revolution and later events on this continent. Christopher Hill started his research in the 1930's under the tremendous influence of Marx on the sociology of revolution, the actuality of the Soviet experience in Russia and world events such as the then Great Depression of that period and the lead up to World War II.

Although Hill was an ardent Stalinist, seemingly to the end, his works, since they were not as subjected to the conforming pressures of the Soviet political line that he adhered to, are less influenced by that distorting pressure. More importantly, along the way Professor Hill almost single-handedly brought to life the under-classes that formed the backbone of the plebeian efforts during that English revolution. We would, surely know far less about, Fifth Monarchists, Brownists, Ranters, panters, shakers, fakers and Quakers who populated the social landscape without the sharp eye of the good professor. All to the tune of, and in the spirit of that famous line from John Milton's Paradise Lost, except instead of trying to explain the ways of god to man the Professor tried to explain ways of our earlier plebeian brothers and sisters to us.

This volume contains some specialized studies by Hill, some reviews by him of the work of his peers in his area of expertise and some updating of his earlier works in light of the new research that came cascading along after the tumult of the 1960's died down and some student radicals went back to the cloisters of academia to create "revolutions" of the mind rather than of the streets. A look at the selections here run the gamut of religiously-tinged topics, the language that the social struggles of the time took; a serious look at the struggle to create a national English Church and the place of dissenting clergy and laity almost from the beginning ; the various policies of the Archbishops of Canterbury in the formation of that church; my favorite article in this book a look at the history of dissent from the early days of the Lollards; an always informative piece on the religion of the primitive communist hero Gerrard Winstanley of the Diggers experiment on St. George's Hill (worthy of a separate review of its own; and, a rather nice appreciation of the religious/political doings of the Muggletonians and other sects and sectlets. This is just a good, solid look at religion. Without an understanding of this for the 17th century in England one is at a lost to understand the nature of that revolution (or even that a revolution occurred). Kudos (again), Professor.

*Once Again On Christopher Hill And The English Revolution

Click on the headline to link to a "Wikipedia" entry for Marxist historian, Christopher Hill.

BOOK REVIEW

The Collected Essays of Christopher Hill, Volume 3: People and Ideas In Seventeenth-Century England, University of Massachusetts Press, Amherst, 1986


The name and work of the late British Marxist historian Christopher Hill should be fairly well known to readers of this space who follow my reviews on the subject of the 17th century English Revolution that has legitimately been described as the first one of the modern era and that has had profound repercussions, especially on the American revolution and later events on this continent. Christopher Hill started his research in the 1930’s under the tremendous influence of Marx on the sociology of revolution, the actuality of the Soviet experience in Russia and world events such as the then Great Depression of that period and the lead up to World War II.

Although Hill was an ardent Stalinist, seemingly to the end, his works, since they were not as subjected to the conforming pressures of the Soviet political line that he adhered to are less influenced by that distorting pressure. More importantly, along the way Professor Hill almost single-handedly brought to life the under classes that formed the backbone of the plebeian efforts during that revolution. We would, surely know far less about, Ranters, panters, shakers and fakers without the sharp eye of the good professor. All to the tune of, and in the spirit of John Milton’s Paradise Lost, except instead of trying to explain the ways of god to man the Professor tried to explain ways of our earlier plebeian brothers and sisters to us.

This volume contains some specialized studies by Hill, some reviews by him of the work of his peers in his area of expertise and some updating of his earlier works in light of the new research that came cascading along after the tumult of the 1960’s died down and some student radicals went back to the cloisters of academia to create “revolutions” of the mind rather than the streets. A short list of the topics covered here is illuminating: an update of the relationship between the Parliament and the people in the 17th century; a quick overview of the role of the great man, here Oliver Cromwell, in a revolution; the always nagging question of whether that revolution was bourgeois or not and various controversies over the role of the state in the new social order.

Furthermore there is a very interesting review of the Lisle letters that are very informative (and gossipy) about household conditions during this period. And a rather speculative piece on the “communism” of the various West Indian pirate communities. I should also mention a interesting article about Karl Marx’s acclimation to British life as an exile; an early review of the then “new” topic of homosexuality in the 17th century and the rudiments of a subculture; and, an arresting article on the methodological disputes in the academia over the use of 17th century parish registers to make generalizations about lower class sexual mores, traditions and attitudes as the modern world emerges.

This last piece is worthy of a separate commentary but for now just read the thing and learn something about the problems that we all have to face when dealing with a period that is remote enough in time for us to be clueless in many regards about what these people were about. Finally, there is a nice little intriguing tidbit about the relationship between science and magic, or rather the brewing controversy between those two ways of looking at the world. I think old muse John Milton was looking over his shoulder when Hill wrote that one. Read on.

Sunday, December 07, 2008

*Poet's Corner- John Milton's "Pardise Lost"

Click on title to link to Wikipedia's entry for John Milton's master poetic attempt to "explain the ways of god to man", "Paradise Lost". Short of posting the whole work this, at least, gives a taste of what he was trying to do. Of course, check Christopher Hill's, "Milton and The English Revolution", or or sources to get the real "skinny".

Sunday, September 16, 2007

WHEN THE WORLD DID NOT TURN UPSIDE DOWN-THE DEFEATED IN THE ENGLISH REVOLUTION

BOOK REVIEW

THE EXPERIENCE OF DEFEAT-MILTON AND SOME CONTEMPORIES, CHRISTOPHER HILL, PENGUIN BOOKS, NEW YORK, 1984

As I have noted in previous reviews of the work of Professor Hill although both the parliamentary and royalist sides in the English Revolution, the major revolutionary event of the 17th century, quoted the Bible, particularly the newer English versions, for every purpose from an account of the Fall to the virtues of primitive communism that revolution cannot be properly understood except as a secular revolution. The first truly secular revolution of modern times. The late pre-eminent historian of the under classes of the English Revolution Professor Hill has taken the myriad ideas, serious and zany, that surfaced during the period between 1640-60, the heart of the revolutionary period and analyzed their contemporary importance. Moreover, he has given us, as far as the surviving records permit, what happened to those ideas, the people who put them forth and their various reactions to the defeat of their ideas in the late revolutionary period and at the Restoration. And through it all hovers Hill’s ever present muse for the period, John Milton- the poet who tried to explain in verse the 'ways of God' to humankind at the failure of the ‘revolution of the saints’.

As been noted by more than one historian there is sometimes a disconnect between the ideas in the air at any particular time and the way those ideas get fought out in political struggle. In this case secular ideas, or what would have passed for such to us, like the questions of the divinity of the monarch, of social, political and economic redistribution and the nature of the new society (the second coming) were expressed in familiar religious terms. That being the case there is no better guide to understanding the significance of the mass of biblically-driven literary articles and some secular documents produced in the period than Professor Hill. Here we meet up again, as we have in Hill's other numerous volumes of work, with the democratic oppositionists, the Levelers; the Diggers, especially the thoughts of their leader Gerrard Winstanley, in many aspects the forerunner of a modern branch of communist thought; the Ranters, Seekers and Quakers who among them challenged every possible orthodox Christian theory and the usual cast of individual political and religious radicals like Samuel Fisher and, my personal favorite, Abiezer Coppe.

As I have noted elsewhere a key to understanding that plebian entry onto history's stage and that underscores the widespread discussion of many of these trends is Cromwell's New Model Army where the plebian base and the frustrated professional middle class, for a time anyway, had serious input into the direction that society might take. Some fellow historians have criticized Hill on the question of how important this was in the overall scheme of things but the last word on the impact of those ideas and their influence has not been spoken. In any case, as these radicals were moved to the margins of political society they had various reactions familiar as well in later revolutions- passivity, silence, a personally opportunistic acceptance of the new order and, in too few cases, a fight to save the revolutionary gains. In many ways Professor Hill's book is a study of what happened when for lack of a better term, the Thermodorian reaction- the ebb of the revolution set in and a portion of those 'masterless' men had to deal with the consequences of defeat for the plebian masses during the Protectorate and Restoration. The heroic attempts to save the revolution in danger by the Fifth Monarchy uprisings, composed of former soldiers, and the return of Quakers to the Army in 1659 only underscore that point. Those of us on today’s embattled plebian left now know we had some honorable predecessors.

Monday, September 03, 2007

*ANOTHER LOOK AT THE WORLD TURNED UPSIDE DOWN-Professor Christopher Hill's Look At The Great English Revolution Of The 1600s

Click on title to link to Wikipedia's entry for Professor Christopher Hill.

BOOK REVIEW

THE WORLD TURNED UPSIDE DOWN, CHRISTOPHER HILL, PENGUIN BOOKS, 1972


Although both the parliamentary and royalist sides in the English Revolution, the major revolutionary event of the 17th century, quoted the Bible, particularly the newer English versions, for every purpose from an account of the Fall to the virtues of primitive communism that revolution cannot be properly understood except as a secular revolution. The first truly secular revolution of modern times. The late pre-eminent historian of the under classes of the English Revolution, Christopher Hill, has taken the myriad ideas, serious and zany, that surfaced during the period between 1640-60, the heart of the revolutionary period, and given us his take on some previously understudied and misunderstood notions that did not make the conventional history books.

As has been noted by more than one Marxist historian, including Leon Trotsky in his history of the Russian Revolution, there is sometimes a disconnect between the ideas in the air at any particular time and the way those ideas get fought out in political struggle. In this case secular ideas, or what would have passed for such to us, like the questions of the divinity of the monarch, of social, political and economic redistribution and the nature of the new society (the second coming) were expressed in familiar religious terms. That being the case there is no better guide to understanding the significance of the mass of biblically-driven literary articles and some secular documents produced in the period than Professor Hill. Here we meet up again, as we have in Hill's other numerous volumes of work, with the democratic oppositionists the Levelers; the Diggers, especially the thoughts of their leader Gerrard Winstanley, in many aspects the forerunner of a modern branch of communist thought; the Ranters, Seekers and Quakers who among them challenged every possible orthodox Christian theory and the usual cast of individual political and religious radicals like Samuel Fisher and, my personal favorite, Abiezer Coppe.

In this expansively footnoted book Mr. Hill, as he has elsewhere, connects the dramatic break up of traditional agrarian English society; the resulting vast increase of 'masterless' men not bound to traditional authority and potentially receptive to new ideas; the widespread availability of the protestant Bible brought about by the revolution in printing and thus permitting widespread distribution to the masses; the effects of the Protestant Reformation on individual responsibility; the discrediting of the theology of the divine right of kings and the concept of the man of blood exemplified by Charles I; the role of the priesthood of all believers that foreshadow a very modern concept of the validity of individual religious expression; radical interpretations of equality and primitive communism, particularly the work of the afore-mentioned Gerrard Winstanley ; the Puritan ethic and many more subjects of interests to bring to life what the common people who hitherto had barely entered the stage of history were thinking and doing.

As I have noted elsewhere a key to understanding that entry onto history's stage and that underscores the widespread discussion of many of these trends is Oliver Cromwell's New Model Army where the plebeian base, for a time anyway, had serious input into the direction that society might take. In many ways Professor Hill's book is a study of what happened when the, for lack of a better term, the Thermodorian reaction- the ebb of the revolution set in and a portion of those 'masterless' men had to deal with the consequences of defeat for the plebeian masses during the Protectorate and Restoration. I might also add that some of the ideas presented here seem very weird even for that time but some seem so advanced, especially in the case of Winstanley, that they put many a modern thinker to shame. Hell, in American society some of those Levelers and Diggers would be standing with us in the left wing of political society fighting today's 'royalists and reactionaries'. Thanks, Professor Hill.

Wednesday, June 13, 2007

ON BEING GOD'S ENGLISHMEN

BOOK REVIEW

THE BIBLE AND THE 17TH CENTURY ENGLISH REVOLUTION, CHRISTOPHER HILL, PENQUIN,NEW YORK, 1993


Although both the parliamentary and royalist sides in the English Revolution, the major revolutionary event of the 17th century, quoted the Bible, particularly the newer English versions, for every purpose from an account of the fall to the virtues of primitive communism that revolution cannot be properly understood except as a secular revolution. The first truly secular revolution of modern times. So why would the pre-eminent historian of the English Revolution, the late Christopher Hill, write a whole book about the influence of the Bible in that revolutionary period?

As been noted by more than one commentator there is sometimes a disconnect between the ideas in the air at any particular time and the way those ideas get fought out in political struggle. In this case secular ideas, or what would have passed as such to us, such as the questions of the divinity of the monarch, of social, political and economic redistribution and the nature of the new society (the second coming) were expressed in familiar religious terms. That being the case there is no better guide to understanding the significance of the mass of biblical literary articles produced in the period than Professor Hill. The only objection one can have is that he overloads his argument for the importance of the Bible in the social discourse of the times with more examples than necessary and with a certain redundancy and overlap in the subjects he looks at such as the importance of the garden (of Eden), the wilderness and the hedge in Biblical narrative, the concept of England as a chosen nation and the English as a chosen people and of the decisive weight of the Old Testament as a source of inspiration (and vengeance). However, this is only a minor objection.

In this expansive book Mr. Hill connects the wide spread use of the Bible with the revolution in printing bringing its message to the masses; the effects of the Protestant Reformation on individual responsibility for bible study and leading a moral life; various interpretations of Adam’s fall, the consequences of that fall and the possibilities for redemption; the theology of the divine right of kings and the concept of the man of blood exemplified by Charles I; the role of the priesthood of all believers that foreshadow a very modern concept of the validity of individual religious expression; radical interpretations of equality and primitive communism, particularly the work of Gerrard Winstanley ; the Puritan ethic and many more subjects of interests. Here Hill also uses his usual cast of characters that one has met in his other works including, Oliver Cromwell, Edmund Sexby, Hugh Peters, John Bunyan, the above-mentioned Gerrard Winstanley, Abiezer Coppe, the Levelers, the Ranters, the Quakers and the Fifth Monarchists. And seemingly threading through the whole narrative, John Milton. Take note and read on.